Book of the Week

Wherever you go in New York City, you can see evidence of the city’s Catholic past: schools, colleges, parishes, healthcare institutions. Did you ever wonder how they got started? A good place to look for an answer is in this new history of the Archdiocese of New York by Monsignor Thomas J. Shelley. Monsignor Shelley, who teaches historical theology at Fordham University, wrote this book for the Archdiocese’s bicentennial in 2008. It’s a lavishly illustrated 623-page tome that you probably won’t want to bring to the beach, but you might enjoy reading in the comfort of your home. It pretty much contains everything you ever wanted to know about Catholic Gotham: Manhattan, the Bronx, Staten Island, and upstate New York. (Brooklyn and Queens are part of the Brooklyn Diocese, which has a book that I’ll feature as next week’s “Book of the Week.”) For lovers of local Catholic history, this book is a dream come true. To buy a copy of this book, you should contact the Archdiocese’s Public Relations Office at (212) 371-1000.